


All From the Window

by ThoughtsBeyond



Category: Hamlet - All Media Types, Hamlet - Shakespeare
Genre: (Best summary of this fic imo), Angst, Happy Ending, Kinda, M/M, More like... Tragicomic Danish Boyfriends, also kinda - Freeform, listen its 4:40 i tried to upload this once and it Did Not Work so i am at my Limit here, tragic danish boyfriends - Freeform
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-02-02
Updated: 2021-02-02
Packaged: 2021-03-13 11:21:42
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,582
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29152698
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ThoughtsBeyond/pseuds/ThoughtsBeyond
Summary: Horatio believes in ghosts, this is true. But still he tells himself there’s nobody here, as his quill moves back and forth in its jar of ink. If this is indeed a haunting and not a fit of madness, it’s a most peculiar one. There’s nobody here.If that’s the case, then would it be that bad to say something, anything, out loud?Maybe just once, if the voice appears again.~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~Horatio feels Hamlet's presence, and while he fears being drawn into madness, he fears coming to terms with Hamlet's death far more.
Relationships: Hamlet/Horatio (Hamlet)
Kudos: 12





	All From the Window

Late nights turning into early mornings, spent drafting by dim candlelight, frantically writing every detail he can imagine. Trying to recall every fact about Hamlet possible. His brain’s very matter fading in and out of existence, in and out of reality, until he exists just as much as Hamlet does now.

Then, an object rattling just the slightest, or, shortly afterwards, falling. 

This has become a telltale sign for his arrival, although such an occurrence--such manipulation of the material world--had never been covered in Horatio’s classes. There are many lessons to be learned in this world and far beyond its reaches that Horatio could never learn at Wittenberg. (He remembers vividly, of course, when Hamlet told him something similar. How Horatio wishes he remembered the words themselves more than the way the prince’s lips curved up ever so slightly, his hair blown by the icy air, his eyes about to twitch in a frighteningly organic way, a phenomenon that didn’t resurface until months after his decision to permanently play the part of someone else. How Horatio wishes he remembered something of worth, something that could be recorded and preserved in a way that others could understand.)

It’s usually lost in thoughts like this that the whispers come. First, only his name. “Horatio,” that familiar voice says, at first just from below, but then from all around him. From high above, down below, and even the sides of Horatio’s chamber, sound spills out in a way that lets Horatio believe, just for a moment, that everything’s back to normal. Even as unnatural as the sensation is, to hear the heir all around him. It brings chills to his spine and goosebumps all over his body. If you looked inside the core of his being and found his soul, if such a pitiful thing existed, he’s certain it would be shivering.

Soon, Hamlet--or Hamlet’s voice, that is, he must correct himself--is telling Horatio things he wishes he’d done, facts not to forget in his biography, and how much he misses Horatio. It takes all of Horatio’s willpower not to respond. As much as he misses Hamlet, he can’t give into insanity, into madness, like he did.

As much as he hates to admit it, Horatio believes in ghosts. It would be hard not to after one appeared before him, after one begged with a voice that seemed to be weighed down by rusted chains to swear an oath to his son. But there’s a difference between that occurrence and this one. Nobody else is here to witness anything, first of all, and even if they were, Horatio couldn’t be sure it was actually Hamlet unless he saw him the way he saw the ghost of Hamlet’s father, if it really was him, and not some cursed spirit or other. 

Horatio believes in ghosts, this is true. But still he tells himself there’s nobody here, as his quill moves back and forth in its jar of ink. If this is indeed a haunting and not a fit of madness, it’s a most peculiar one. There’s nobody here.

If that’s the case, then would it be that bad to say something, anything, out loud? 

Maybe just once, if the voice appears again.

He waits, but there’s nothing more that night. After finishing a new cluster of words he supposes he’ll call a chapter, he retires to his bed. As he falls asleep, he thinks he hears Hamlet muttering things all around him, but never anything distinguishable. Horatio wants to hear something, anything from Hamlet, another true fact. But how could he trust what could easily be the words of a random spirit, or worse, his own mad mind?

Horatio practically sleepwalks through the next day, formulating a plan to get Marcellus or Bernardo to his chamber. He wouldn’t explain anything to them, so he wouldn’t seem mad if there was nothing to be seen or heard, but if any signs presented themselves, he would have a witness.

Horatio soon forgets how he led the guards to his chamber, as do they. After an hour or so of awkward exchanges (Horatio hasn’t talked to Bernardo since the day before the Mousetrap, and Marcellus has just gotten back after a lengthy leave), they’ve left the room. Horatio expects Hamlet to start whispering again after they leave, but there’s only silence.

It’s not Hamlet talking. It’s Horatio’s mind, most likely. But why haven’t any symptoms of this madness shown tonight? Could it be the company of others that prevents its onset?

About to get in bed, Horatio remembers—only when he’s penning Hamlet’s story does anything occur. Horatio could avoid doing that to prove this theory, or he could do it to prove it, as well. 

He takes a roll of parchment, some ink, and his quill. It’s almost certainly the second it’s been rolled out that the parchment rises slightly, as if something is blowing from underneath it. It’s never the whole thing, just one spot at a time, but it’s still the most concrete piece of evidence Horatio’s gathered.

Before he writes anything more, he gets up to ensure his window is closed. It’s been open for a while, now that he notices. Wide open, in fact. That could’ve been the source of most of these problems. It would certainly explain the cold. As for the voices, those are just things of night. He’s not entirely sure how wind could blow from the window and underneath the parchment, but there has to be some way. He shuts the window and prepares to go to bed once more. It’s all from the window.

Drifting off, he hears a small creak, and some scratching sound, not unlike one made by his own quill. He knows it’s just sounds of the night squeezing in from outside. His eyelids will remain shut, as shut as the window is now, as shut as his mind is to any other explanation for what’s been going on.

At once, something falls over and lets out a chirpy note, there’s a slam against the wall with a loud thwack, and a gust of wind blows in his face. He supposes he has no choice but to wake up now.

Before his eyelids can even adjust to the ceiling, he notices the window opposite of him has been flung completely open. The wind must be strong tonight, he thinks as he gets up to close it once again. Turning around as he does, his eyes almost glance over his table.

His table. What’s happened to his table?

His ink has spilled onto his parchment, most of which is now on the floor. Everything on the table is covered in black splotches now. Completely ruined. Only one bit of writing remains, and it’s not even two lines long.

And it’s not even his own.

Not that the writing isn’t familiar. Almost criminally large amounts of space between words, written so heavily that the words are likely carved into the table below them. The quality to them is somehow sharp and dull all at once, and he would recognize it anywhere.

(Curse Hamlet for always forcing Horatio to be distracted from his words by that indescribable aura he made surround them. With everyone else, Horatio sees the facts. With Hamlet, he sees everything but.)

Horatio just now realizes he still has yet to read just what Hamlet wrote him. He closes his eyes in preparation, feels his heart beating, feels Hamlet’s muddied words and faces and inflections surround him all in tune. They easily build up to a cacophony, until Horatio has to open his eyes. They stop. He looks down at the parchment.

I’d say I loved you most of all, but then again, you were the only one I think I loved at all.

Oh no.

Horatio looks away from the sentence, from his scattered parchments, from the table. As soon as his head glanced at it, it’s snapped back to his bed, where he’s headed now. If he looks over what’s been written any longer, he’ll obsess over it. He can’t. As much as what’s on that parchment is evidence enough for him, he’ll never get another soul to believe it. (He wouldn’t need another soul in his life if Hamlet was still around, if he could confirm Hamlet was still around. He can, can’t he? Or is he just not ready for another life-changing revelation?)

He turns around in bed. The words he’s read turn to dark liquid and seep into his very being, until he’s forgotten the words themselves. Their meaning, the feeling and burning and aching he felt in his chest upon reading them is preserved, even if the very letters might not be. At least these ones will still be there when he rises in the morning, like the ones in all the letters Hamlet wrote in the past.

(As it turns out, they’re not. In his mental spiral over the message, Horatio failed to dispose of the ink surrounding them. It’s covered every piece of parchment on the table, and most likely stained everything in the vicinity for good. Upon first waking up, an hour or two before the rise of the sun, the only thing Horatio can do is feel his hands shake as the terrible knowledge tugs on his mind, tugs on him, that he’ll never have proof Hamlet wrote that; he’ll never even be sure it wasn’t a dream. It’s only with the lucidity that morning light brings that Horatio starts worrying about the mess he’s made. Whether the he in question is Hamlet or himself, he’s frightened to realize he doesn’t know.)

It’s after another short breakdown that Horatio realizes there’s no reasonable way to explain his mess to, say, Fortinbras. Even if he could explain it, it would be the most embarrassing thing that’s happened to him since after Hamlet died. He’s not going to risk it.

For a few days, maybe a week or so, Horatio doesn’t do anything at night at all. (Alive or dead, true or false, Horatio knows that once he’s had some interaction with the prince, he needs more. And now, he can’t even have that.) He goes to bed as soon as his regular day’s work is done. For a couple nights, there’s nothing. The third, the faintest sound as his window opens again. He pays it no mind. On the fourth night, it slams against the wall once, which wakes Horatio up, but doesn’t impede him from going back to sleep. On the fifth night, there are too many slams to count, leading Horatio to finally investigate. He gets up from his bed to check the window.

(The wind blows in his face just the way it did that night, when Horatio swore to keep Hamlet’s secrets so he wouldn’t worry, when Horatio finally had to realize that they were in too deep, the two of them, and that there was no way out. When Horatio was worried, for himself and his well-being, because he didn’t want a way out. When Hamlet looked at him with such sharpness and nerve that Horatio is shocked to this day that he didn’t grab him then and there. When their fates were sealed, bound to Denmark, bound to the castle ground forever. Perhaps Marcellus sensed that last amendment, that last thing Horatio never considered. Perhaps that’s why he left so suddenly the next morning.)

Lost in thought again. Horatio shakes his head and continues stumbling to the open window. Once he’s there, he almost closes it. But the wind blows at his soul, hitting it like wind chimes playing an ecstatic song that’s been lost in his memory, hidden with pain and suffering and everything terrible this relentless love has brought. Even with Hamlet dead, dead for good, one would think, he’s far from done. Why not open the window? Why not give in to wonder for what could have been for one more night, before he gets back to work on the biography and moves on? It can’t be any more harmful than anything he’s done recently, tampering with spirits, things he doesn’t understand.

At once, he pushes his head out the window. The wind, which was formerly blowing towards his chamber, now blows out. Horatio almost falls out of the window and onto the ground a story below, not because of the wind, but because of what--or who--is carried on its current.

He’s not wearing what he wore when he died, some unfortunate fencing outfit that Horatio couldn’t help but laugh at upon seeing, at least when its wearer was alive. Instead, this ethereal, floating version of the former heir is wearing a long, inky cloak that envelopes, embodies his being. Some more majestic version of a raven, Horatio thinks to himself Horatio had never seen him wear such a thing while he was alive, although he wouldn’t be surprised if he did. Perhaps the cloak was so extravagant of him that he couldn’t wear it entirely in the realm of the living.

Horatio still can’t work up the nerve to say anything. He reaches out his arm. Could he touch him?

As if to answer, as if he can read his thoughts, Hamlet moves towards Horatio and places his hand, cold, but still somewhat solid, on the back of Horatio’s. He’s crying now, no doubt about that. He doesn’t think Hamlet would like to see this side of him--emotional, begging for something, anything. Hamlet always said passion never controlled Horatio, and so he attempted to remain aloof when the prince flustered him the most. Even when he thought in private about how hopeless the situation was for him, he restrained himself from showing any evidence of that at all, knowing how Hamlet would feel seeing him in such a state.

Hamlet always said passion never controlled Horatio, but Hamlet did, and by heaven those two are one and the same in Horatio’s mind.

Hamlet squeezes what he can get of Horatio’s hand lightly. Then, he looks right up at Horatio. His eyes are more piercing than ever. He tilts his head and smiles, and Horatio half-wishes--no, no more lying to himself, he fully wishes--that he could just fall out of the window then and there, and accept this vision wholeheartedly.

But is that what Hamlet would want, Horatio wonders?

The apparition Hamlet saw told him that his uncle killed his father. Surely that’s something Hamlet was suspecting, perhaps something he even wanted to hear. What if it’s the same here for Horatio? There’s some vile thing trying to draw him into madness, telling him with the strange language Hamlet uses? Used? He can’t be sure.

But in that question lies the answer: No spirit, however omnipotent, could reproduce every grandly miniscule facet of Hamlet’s essence in an apparition. Horatio is certain of this, to the very core of his being.

At once, he falls out of the window. Or maybe he let himself fall, or maybe the wind blew him away, or maybe Hamlet willed him to. The only thing keeping him in the air now is Hamlet, now holding onto his hand with both of his.

The chilling wind blows away all of the words of conversations prior, all of the baggage of the past that’s been clouding Horatio’s mind. (When you’re dangling by the grip of a ghost, you don’t have time for that, now do you?)

**Author's Note:**

> I found the beginning of a fic I tried to write half a year or so ago, and thought I'd finish it up. Also it's almost five in the fucking morning. I'm honestly not proud of it, but if you liked it or want to see something similar, consider leaving a comment? I wish you all the joy in the worm


End file.
